How does reporting someone "AFK" in a bg work?

So my question is, how does it work then I click on someone and report them afk in a bg? I figured it takes a certian amount of people reporting the same person to toggle some sort of afk timer for that person to get into combat. Some times when I'm getting really angry with all the afker's I report them like 16 times. My wsg yesterday had 6 afk bots in it, it made my heart sad. So can anyone explain the system to me without flaming blizzard and just saying "teehee it doesnt work".

Basically it takes 3 or more people click to report AFK on the player. It's very hard to get that done anymore for a number of reasons.

Once done that lets them know they have 2 minutes basically. Once those 2 minutes are up, they will be removed from the battleground and given a 15 minute debuff that prevents them from queueing again.

Since this is a pet peeve of mine I've researched it a lot over the years. Even one person using the report AFK feature is enough to file a report on that person. Over time, even if they are never actually kicked or even marked with the debuff, that triggers a response from Blizzard to investigate. They swear up and down each gets investigated in time. So please only use this for "real" afkers or people not playing.

Once investigated either for being marked often or being booted often the player often gets a warning first. After that if they continue to do it, the penalties increase for each offense. Typically this involves removing all gear/honor gained from the practice. If they really don't get the message or are found actually botting, and not just non-participation, they can lose their accounts permanently.

One thing to do is speak out in raid politely that people should report afkers once things get moving. People should be able to afk for quick emergencies but we all know the ones who stay in the cave, on the rock, in base, etc. So call 'em out. What many people don't realize is how easy it is to do.

You can do it from the map by right clicking on their dot. You can do it from the party or raid frames. You can do it, even if you don't see them, by typing /tar NAMEHERE and right clicking their portrait, etc. Lots of ways that are easy to do while you're dead or defending something.

Sometimes they will be players who are actually there who just refuse to play. That is still reportable with the same tools. Blizz has often said that goes against the "spirit of the game" and they handle those people in exactly the same way. Basically queue up and play or don't queue up at all. Often you will find that they get marked and get into combat before being removed. Keep it up.

Finally, if you feel they are being allowed to do this for too long or you're just really compulsive or annoyed: open a ticket to [email protected] which is like doing an in-game ticket except you can type more, not have a ticket open on your screen, and know that it will get handled and entered into the system by a GM. Be sure to include: Player and server name, time of the battleground, and the battleground in question or they can't help you. (Note your time zone as well.)